Video card D3D compatibility - Revit 2010 on Vista / Win7

[Wes Macaulay]

Please describe what hardware you're using with Revit 2010. Include:

• video card model and manufacturer (e.g. Asus Geforce 9600 GT)
• driver version and provider (i.e. manufacturer's driver or nVidia reference)
• operating system and 32-bit or 64-bit (we're only interested in Vista or Win7 in this thread)
  

A summary of working and non working cards will be shown in this post based on input into this forum. "Working" means enabling D3D acceleration in Revit does not cause any problems and improves performance. There is no guarantee that these cards may or may not work for you; it just improves the chances of users choosing a model that works. To check if your card works, open up a non-shadowed 3D view, zoom in close to your model and orbit. Disappearing or flashing objects while orbiting means D3D acceleration is not working properly.

Working Cards

• ATI Mobility Radeon 4650 under Vista 32
• ATI FireGL V5600 under Win7 64
• ATI FireGL V7600
• nVidia Quadro FX580 under Win7 64
• nVidia Quadro FX1800
• nVidia Quadro FX370M (Dell) under Win7 64
• nVidia Quadro FX3800 under Win7 64 (186.30 driver)
• nVidia GeForce 9600 GT / 512MB (Asus EN9600GT Silent), nVidia Driver Version: 195.62 WHQL under Win7 64
• nVidia Quadro NVS 295 (note that this is NOT a CAD card -- it's designed for 2D)

Non-Working Cards

• ATI Mobility Radeon 4670 under Win7 64
• ATI Radeon 4670 under Vista
• ATI FireGL V3400
• ATI FireGL V5600 under Vista
• ATI FireGL V5100 under Win7 64

My experience with Vista and Windows 7 has just begun -- I've been on XP till now and I've heard little from users as to their experiences with their video hardware and driver combinations on Vista and Win7.

For instance, I bought this new Dell laptop because it came with Radeon video, which has been golden for me on XP for years. But with DX enabled in Revit, video performance worsens and objects flicker and disappear in any given view as you zoom in/out (it happens particularly at close range). I'm on Win7 x64 and using Catalyst 9.11. Autodesk provides a recommended driver for the 4600 series Radeons which is Catalyst 9.8, but there is no difference between that and the driver Dell supplies. The 9.11 driver doesn't improve things much.

Are other people seeing this with Geforce and Radeon models -- i.e. DX doesn't work, and it's faster to work with it off? I'll be sorely amused if Geforce hardware works better

[Andrew Dobson]

No problems for me so far:

Dell Precision M2400, Quadro FX370M, Windows 7 64-bit.

Graphics work with no problems with Direct X on.

Graphics performance is the same as XP was.

[Wes Macaulay]

Hmm -- this may just reinforce that getting a CAD card rather than a consumer card is the way to go

[Joef]

Does Autodesk not provide any guidance in this matter? Surely they know what works and what doesn't. If they don't they know they should find out. All this consumer trial and error is a costly waste of time.

[Andrew Dobson]

Support have told me to use the cards on the AutoCAD certified graphics cards for Revit.

The whole graphics card issue seems very random to me. We just use quadro cards as we know they work (although they are slower on our projects upgraded to 2010 than they were in 2009, particulalry with shadows on).

[Wes Macaulay]

That is pretty random, Andrew -- esp since a lot of people have seen display performance increases with 2010 over 2009.

Autodesk needs to get their glue together on graphic cards and Revit. They need a page just like AutoCAD has but for Revit. The word is that Revit and AutoCAD are going to share the DirectX-based graphics back-end (perhaps they do already) -- but the bottom line is, DirectX isn't working and it ought to be. If I turn on D3D my display gets positively sludgy.

But Windows 7 isn't supported yet -- not that I would want to have Vista64 installed instead; this is the future and hopefully the Factory will fix this in the next release

[etornberg]

Win 7 64 Bit
Core I7 860 @ 2.8 GHz
RAC 2010
Nvidia Quadro NVS 295 - no problems whatsoever - and no cooling fan to go bad.
Driver version 191.07

For what's it's worth, I took Wes's recommendations seriously to put the money into the processor and not worry about the video card - it has paid off so far...

Thanks Wes.

[jrostar]

Win Vista x64
Core 2 Duo @ 3.0 GHz
RAC 2010 x64
Nvidia Geforce 9600 GT
Driver 186.18

Flickering & Objects missing when orbiting in 3D view...

-----

Win7 x64
Core 2 Quad @ 2.66 GHz
RAC 2010 x64
Nvidia Geforce 7950 GT
Driver 195.62

Flickering & Objects missing when orbiting in 3D view...

[Joel_A]

RAC 2010
Win7 64-bit
Intel Q9550

Card: ATI FireGL V7700
Driver: Catalyst 8.663.3


No noticeable improvement over lowly Geforce 9400GT. In fact, I think the 9400GT orbitted more smoothly. How the hell is that possible? I tried turning D3D off and on, anti-aliasing off and on... no improvement.

Good thing I only shelled $180. I would've been really ******.

[dzatto]

Although I'm just getting started using Revit (old ACA user) my machine seems to be running it fine. It runs ACA fine as well. I had some trouble with the Nvidia performance driver for Autocad. It prompted me to install it, but when I went to the nvidia web site, the 3800M doesn't even have a CAD performance driver available! So I uninstalled it. so far so good.

Dell M6500 Covet
i7 quad core / 820 processor
Nvidia Quadro FX 3800M
Windows 7 Pro 64